The Best Movies Of Summer 2017

Logan-Lucky-Daniel-CraigLogan Lucky
“Logan Lucky” is Steven Soderbergh’s first film following his so-called “retirement,” which always seemed like an extension of Soderbergh performance art. Now that his Cinemax TV series “The Knick” has been, frustratingly canceled, the 54-year-old writer-director has come back this summer, ready to add more to an impressive filmography. What we have with “Logan Lucky” is a highly entertaining heist movie, set in the NASCAR world, starring Daniel Craig, Adam Driver and Channing Tatum. This was dubbed Ocean’s 7/11 by some, but instead of Danny Ocean’s slick Hollywood gang, there’s the Logans, a family living on the rundown hills of West Virginia. Tatum’s Jimmy Logan is fired from his job and decides it’s time to turn his family’s luck around by employing Redneck Robbers in a plan to steal more than $14 million at the Charlotte Motor Speedway. The heist itself is expertly crafted and features some of the most joyously entertaining sequences this year. There’s an abundance of giddy joy on-screen and the filmmaking is, as always with Soderbergh, infectious. You never really went anywhere, but welcome back regardless, Steven.

okjaOkja
I don’t expect anything else, but a visionary mess when it comes to South Korean director Bong Joon Ho‘s films. And I do mean that as a high compliment. The talented writer-director’s “Okja” is the tale of Mija (Seo-Hyun Ahn) and her beloved genetically-mutated pet pig Okja as they try to flee from the evil Mirando corporation, spearheaded by a deliciously evil Tilda Swinton. Mirando’s cronies want Okja so they can bring her back to the slaughter house.  Mija and Okja are helped by the Animal Liberation Front, a radicalist, though purportedly non-violent group, lead by a well-meaning Paul Dano.  Jake Gyllenhaal is certifiably insane as Dr. Johnny Wilcox, the host of an animal show that seems to be in panic mode due to a ratings decline and sees Okja as his last great hope. Featuring a manic, very loud Gyllenhaal in short-shorts and a creepy mustache, whatever you think about the “big” performance, it’s easy to discern he had a blast in the role. The film switches back and forth between “E.T” whimsy and “Snowpiercer“s bouncily colored, nastily rendered, pop violence. It’s a messy, exhausting ride, but you can’t take your eyes off the screen.

Beach-RatsBeach Rats
Eliza Hittman‘s gorgeously realized “Beach Rats” is a movie driven by the smallest of detailed gestures. There’s anguished, conflicted sexuality which invades the psyche of its central character Frankie, as played by Harris Dickinson. Although he “chills” with his gang of macho-behaving thug friends on the boardwalk, Frankie has a secret: he enjoys having strange sex with older men. Filled with self-loathing, he tries to have flings with Jersey shore girls who are instantly hooked by his rugged good looks. Unfortunately, his efforts to take an interest in women fails miserably. The inability to cope with this fact leads him to drugs, alcoholism, and violence. Dickinson is mesmerizing in the lead role, encompassing a mix of toughness and sensitivity and Hittman’s sophomore oozes with absorbing, dreamlike empathy. “Beach Rats” is a striking movie about the inability to accept one’s true self, and with this much homophobic hatred and filth in Frankie’s orbit, it’s understandable why the movie offers no easy answers about the struggle with identity chafing with the need to belong.

Patti-Cakes$Patti Cake$
I called Geremy Jasper’s “Patti Cake$” a hip-hop “Whiplash” when I first saw it this past January at the Sundance Film Festival, and that’s an apt description for a familiar film that also feels like it’s directed by a new, exciting talent. The film’s breakout star, Australia’s Danielle Macdonald, plays Patti, an overweight, extremely white Jersey-born aspiring rapper who can win any freestyle battle but can’t find a way out of her miserable, blue-collar town. Jasper directs the hell out of the film, and his visually exciting style breaks through the film’s conventional tropes by making you care about Patti, her alcoholic mom and the road to a better life for both of them. The filmmaker pulls a neat trick: although you feel like you have seen a film like this one before, you still feel invigorated by its frames and you can rest assured that there has never been anything quite like “Patti Cake$.”